The North Augusta Chamber of Commerce’s April Power Lunch provided the chance for business leaders to meet a new neighbor coming to Aiken County.
Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, Threads, and other social media platforms, is building an $800 million data center in the Sage Mill Industrial Park.
Laura Warren, Meta’s Community Development Regional Manager, brought the importance of data centers to the personal level. She explained that everything an individual does on their computer or smartphone is processed in a data center to be shared as intended.
“If you ask AI to envision you on a beach with a margarita, and then it sends you back a picture, that information isn’t processed on your phone,” she explained. “It is processed behind the scenes at one of our data centers, which has thousands and thousands of servers. Each server that we have, we have tens of thousands in each of our data centers, can hold more information and process more information than the entire Library of Congress holds.”
She said Meta currently has 28 data centers globally, with 24 of them in the U.S. She said a number of factors brought the company to Aiken County, including a “shovel-ready” site, infrastructure and zoning in place, and a strong pool of local talent from which to hire.
Another factor was access to reliable and renewable energy. Data centers have been a target of criticism for the amount of power they require. “That’s why,” said Warren, “Meta puts an emphasis on building sustainable data centers.”
“All data centers are not created equally,” she said. “Meta designs, builds, and operates some of the, if not the most sustainable, data centers in the entire world. We match 100% of our energy; every megawatt that we take out, we make sure that we put back in. Also, with water, we recycle most of the water we use. It is used multiple times before it is ever turned over to wastewater.”
Beyond the purely business aspects, Warren said Meta looks for a sense of community and strong community partnerships. It began with the March workshop at Aiken Technical College, sponsored by the North Augusta and Aiken Chambers, to train small businesses and nonprofits on how to optimize their social media presence.
Meta has already joined local Chambers of Commerce and is giving a $25,000 donation to United Way of Aiken County.
“We are going to get every child who has been waiting on the wait list for the early childhood literacy program, that’s the Dolly Parton Imagination Library, there are 900 kids right now on the waiting list, and we are able, with that donation, to get every single child off of the list so Aiken County parents can apply for that program,” she said.
She added that the company will provide competitive grants for schools and nonprofit organizations. The community involvement also extends to post-hurricane clean-up, which still needs to be finished.
“Hitchcock Woods was decimated after the hurricane. A lot of the trails have still yet to open. We spoke with them, and they were worried if they would ever be able to figure out the resources to reopen that. So, our amazing construction partners, DPR, they are bringing large equipment, and they are going to clear as many of those trails as they can in two days.”
This is similar to the extensive community involvement from one of Richmond County’s newest corporate citizens. Aurubis Richmond LLC became involved with schools, Chambers of Commerce, and the United Way of the CSRA, leading to the phrase the “Aurubis Effect.”
Will Williams, President and CEO of Western SC Economic Development, agrees that Aiken County is seeing the “Meta Effect.”
“This is what happens when most of our employers are engaged in the community in some form or fashion,” he told ABD. “But when you get a marquee name like Meta or your Bridgestone or your Kimberly Clark, they’re heavily, heavily involved in the community. And so, when one of us economic developers in our communities gets a win, we know it’s going to be good for the community for multiple reasons, not just the jobs and investment.”
Warren said 2027 is the target for the Aiken Data Center to be fully operational. It will create 100 jobs.
